Lux Ex Tenebris
by Link The Hero of Light
Summary: He was the Boy-Who-Lived to the magical world. A hero to many, nobody to himself. Yet he found his courage and was tempered by loss. (Years 1-7)
1. The Boy Who Lived

**Disclaimer: All rights go to JK Rowling.**

There were many moments when the burden of leadership fell heavier than usual on the shoulders of Albus Dumbledore.

He dealt with running the largest and most prominent Magical School on the British Isles, which meant micromanaging budgets under the frankly irritating Malfoy - Controlled Board of Governors, maintaining the wards doming the castle and grounds, stay updated on the current discoveries and current happenings in the magical world to keep school education up to date and safe, which also included tiptoeing around Pureblood Laws and push through the Wizengamot (courtesy of Mr. Malfoy) to legally confiscate Dark Artifacts the majority of the Slytherins and a scattering of other houses insisted on trying to smuggle into Hogwarts.

Banned items were sent to the D.M.L.E as required, he worked for the government for Merlin's sake! Yes, because he didn't want a third year Slytherin to receive a book on how to conjure Fiendfyre, he was obviously on a mission to censor Magical Education. One of his personal favorites was a rumor he knew traced back to Nott Sr, was the idea that he was gradually allowing Hogwarts curriculum quality to lax.

These days he sometimes felt that he needed three of himself to keep up with being Headmaster, (Again, Malfoy and his ilk.) Chief Warlock to the Wizengamot, his most hated position. He'd never wanted to go into politics, but when Tom's followers started to push their pureblood agenda, he had taken the position to oppose them. He had also been practically shoved into being Britain's representative to the I.C.W, post World War Two.

He was far too tied up by loose ends. Wealthy Death Eaters were walking free, even during this night. They had all pleaded the Imperius and he should've made his move then. With the whole of Britian celebrating, security had fallen. Diggle and his fireworks, for instance.

Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew where unaccounted for. Severus Snape was a double agent, but a snake with a lion's soul. Things would've been much worse without his help. The McKinnons, the Bones, and the Prewetts were all extinct in the male line. The Order of the Phoenix was still on high alert, along with the Aurors.

How had he missed the signs? What did he miss? Where had he gone wrong with Tom Riddle, now known as Lord Voldemort?

Those thoughts soon drifted back to his own misguided youth. How he had lost sight of the things that were really important? Those mistakes had lead to a wizarding world war. It covered nearly all of Europe. Gellert's reign was near its peak during Poland and the Blitzkrieg.

The truth was he was afraid of Gellert. The last time they had fought, his sister Ariana had lost her life. Himself and his brother couldn't even defeat his friend when it was two against one. He hadn't even had the Elder Wand then.

It was his fault.

If he had been paying more attention to his sister, instead of being off with Elphias….She wouldn't…They wouldn't…

Dear, sweet Ariana was never the same again. Her magic turned her inward, drove her mad, and exploded out of her when she couldn't control it. She became an Obscurial. When Gellert found out, he was eager to harness her, to use her as a weapon. It was then that the blinders finally fell.

The three-way duel was intense. Neither he or Aberforth knew what had killed her. The blast, the shrapnel, or the quick death of the Killing Curse. It had taken him too long to mentally ready himself to face his friend. He had to come to terms with his sister's death, not let it consume him and move on with his life.

The War had drained him, Tom's revolution even more so. He was a tired old man with responsibilities he never wanted. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Maybe it didn't apply to all humanity, but it was definitely true for him. Perhaps better men were out there, but such men were rare.

He had recently acquired a mirror known as the Mirror of Erised. Looking into it, he had seen what he had expected. His family alive, well, and together. He had tried to mend things with his brother Aberforth, but work, being punched in the nose and having the door to the Hog's Head slammed in his face made things difficult.

Rummaging around in his cloak, he brought out his Deluminator. Clicking it twelve times, all the lights were now out. He felt, more than saw, a familiar presence.

"Fancy seeing you here, Professor McGonagall."

"How did you know it was me?" McGonagall asked.

He smiled to himself. "My dear Professor, I've never seen a cat sit so stiffly."

"You'd be stiff if you'd been sitting on a brick wall all day." McGonagall said briskly.

"All day? When you could've been celebrating? I must have passed a dozen feasts and parties on the way here." His brother had a full bar for one.

"Oh, yes. Everyone's celebrating, all right. You'd think they'd be a bit more careful, but no – even the Muggles have noticed something's going on. It was on their news." She jerked her head towards the Dursley's dark living room windows. "Flocks of owls, shooting stars down in Kent. I'd bet that was Dedalus Diggle, he never did have much sense."

"You can't blame them." He thought back to the fallen. "We have had precious little to celebrate for eleven years."

"I know that, but that's no excuse to lose our common sense. People are being downright careless, out in the streets in broad daylight, not even wearing Muggle clothes, swapping rumors. A fine thing, if the day You – Know – Who seems to have been disappeared at last, the muggles found out about us all. I suppose he really _has_ gone, Dumbledore?"

"It certainly seems so. We have much to be thankful for. Lemon drop?" I asked.

"A _what_?" I didn't know what it was but some people just didn't like Lemon Drops.

"A kind of muggle sweet I am rather fond of." I answered.

"No, thank you. As I say, even if You – Know – Who really _has_ gone – ."

"My dear Professor, surely a sensible person like yourself can call him by his name? All this You – Know - Who nonsense, for eleven years I have been trying to persuade people to call him by his proper name, Voldemort." I rustled through the pockets of my robes.

 _Ah, there they were._

"It gets all so confusing if we keep saying, You – Know – Who. I have never seen any reason to be frightened of saying Voldemort's name."

"I know you haven't. You're different. Everyone knows you are the only one You – Know – oh, all right, Voldemort was frightened of." McGonagall said.

"You flatter me. Voldemort has powers I will never have."

"Only because you're too – well – _noble_ to use them."

" _No, I know the cost of such power."_

"It's lucky it's dark. I haven't blushed so much since Madame Pomfrey told me she like my new earmuffs."

"You know what everyone's saying? About what finally stopped him?" McGonagall asked.

I kept from sighing. The reason why we were here tonight. I popped a Lemon Drop into my mouth.

"What they are _saying_ is that last night Voldemort turned up in Godric's Hollow. He went to find the Potters. The rumor is that Lily and James Potter are…are…that they're…dead."

I bowed my head. _"Another child orphaned."_

McGonagall gasped. "Lily and James…I can't believe it…I didn't want to believe it…. Albus…"

McGonagall shivered. "That's not all, they're saying he tried to kill the Potter's son, Harry. But – he couldn't. He couldn't kill that little boy. No one knows why or how, but they're saying that when he couldn't kill Harry Potter, Voldemort's power somehow broke and that's why he's gone. Of all the things to stop him, but how did Harry survive?"

"We may never know." I said. _"A life for a life."_ Powerful and ancient magic was at work. Love and death were intertwined that night. I absentmindedly looked at my watch. "Hagrid's late. I suppose he told you I would be here?" Hagrid had a flaw of letting things slip, but he was loyal. Loyalty was hard to come by in dark times.

"Yes. I don't suppose why you are _here_ of all places?" McGonagall asked.

"I've come to bring Harry to his aunt and uncle, they are the only family he has left now." The words were ashes in his mouth. The will was very clear, under no circumstances was Harry to be left with Lily's sister. However, Sirius was elsewhere and Lupin had a problem that would make him unfit to be a father. Not to mention Lupin held so much bitterness towards himself for his unfortunate life circumstances.

"You don't mean…you _can't_ mean the people that live here?" McGonagall pointed down towards number four. "Dumbledore…you can't. I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find people that were less like us. And they've got this son…I saw him kicking his mother all the way up the street, screaming for sweets! And the husband…calling him a pig would be an insult to pigs! Harry Potter come and live here!"

"It's the best place for him." _"There was no other choice."_ "His aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything when he is older. I've written them a letter."

McGonagall sat down on the wall, as if in a state of shock. It had been a very trying few years. "A letter?" She repeated. "You think you can explain all this in a letter? These people will never be able to understand him! He will be famous…a legend…I wouldn't be surprised if this was known as Harry Potter Day in the future. People have been talking about him like he's the next Merlin. Books will be written about him, every child in our world will know his name."

I sighed. "Exactly. It would be enough to turn any boy's head. Famous before he could walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can't you see how better off he would be growing up away from all that, until he's ready to take it?"

McGonagall looked like she wanted to argue back. "Yes…Yes, you're right of course. But how is the boy getting here, Dumbledore?"

"Hagrid's bringing him." I answered.

"You think it wise to trust Hagrid with something as important as this?"

"I would trust Hagrid with my life." I answered.

"His heart is in the right place, but you can't pretend he's not careless. He does tend to…what was that?"

I heard a low rumbling sound that soon built up to a roar. Black's motorcycle was impossible to miss with how loud it was. I looked up. Hagrid descended riding Black's motorcycle.

"Hagrid. At last. No problems, I trust?" The half-giant towered over him by a couple feet, but he really was a gentle giant. Just had a skewed sense of danger.

"No, sir. House was almost destroyed, but I got him out before the muggles started swarmin' around. Fell asleep as we were flyin' over Bristol." Hagrid told him.

Black had just lost his best friend and was probably grieving for that loss. I looked within the bundle of blankets. A baby boy lay fast asleep. Under a tuft of jet-black hair, I could see a lightning bolt scar.

Sowilo, the sun rune governing victory and success through individual willpower. Or was it Eihwaz, liberation from the fear of death? Representing the boy's victory over death that night.

"Is that where - ?" McGonagall whispered.

"Yes. He'll have that scar forever."

"Couldn't you do something about it, Dumbledore?"

"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a prefect map of the London underground. Well – give him here, Hagrid - we'd best get this over with."

I took Harry from Hagrid and turned towards Number Four. "Could I say goodbye to him, sir?" Hagrid asked. Then he began crying like a wounded dog.

"Shhh! You'll wake the muggle's!" McGonagall said.

"S – Sorry." Hagrid sobbed, burying his face in a large spotted handkerchief and burying his face in it. "I – I just c – c - can't stand it – Lily an James dead – an poor little Harry off ter live with Muggles – " McGonagall patted Hagrid on the back.

I laid Harry gently down on Number Four's doorstep. The Elder Wand was reacting to the close proximity of one of Peverell's blood, giving off a faint warmth in his robes. Placing a letter in Harry's blankets, I returned to the others. "Well that's that. We have no other business here. We may as well go join the celebrations." The last word tasted like ashes. A taste I was all too familiar with.

"Yeah." Hagrid said in a very muffled voice. "I'll be takin' Sirius his bike back. G'night Professor McGonagall – Professor Dumbledore, sir."

Wiping his eyes on a jacket sleeve, Hagrid swung himself onto the motorcycle and kicked the engine into life, with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night sky. "I shall see you soon, I expect, Professor McGonagall."

McGonagall blew her nose in reply. Walking back down the street, I turned and clicked the Put-Outer. Twelve balls of light raced back to the streetlamps. I glanced back at Number Four, at the bundle of blankets and the baby I had left there.

"Good luck, Harry Potter." With a swish of my cloak, I apparated back to Hogwarts. Fawkes gave a welcoming croon as soon as he saw me. "It's been a very trying night, old friend." Fawkes cooed softly. I sat down, barely regarding the paperwork explosion on my desk.

For the first time in decades, he didn't know what to do or if his actions where the right ones.


	2. The Vanishing Glass

"Up! Get Up! Now!"

I awoke with a start, his aunt rapping on the door.

I groaned. I had been having a good dream too. This time it was about a flying motorcycle. I smelled cooking bacon.

Getting dressed, I stumbled out of the cupboard under the stairs where I slept. "Are you up yet?" His Aunt Petunia asked.

"Nearly." I said, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.

"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon and don't you dare let it burn. I want everything to prefect on Duddy's birthday." I barely managed to avoid groaning.

Dudley's birthday – how could I have forgotten? That meant I had to stay at Mrs. Figg's house while the Dursley's went out to fun places.

"What did you say?" His aunt snapped.

"Nothing." I grumbled.

Coming into the kitchen, the table was almost hidden beneath Dudley's presents. It looked like his whale of a cousin had gotten the new computer, second television and the racing bike he wanted. Dudley hated exercise, so the last one was a mystery to me. Unless it involved punching somebody.

Dudley's favorite punching bag was me, but I was very fast despite how skinny I was. I wore Dudley's old clothes, so I looked even skinnier and smaller than I really was. The glasses I wore were held together by tape on the bridge of my nose. The only thing that I liked about my appearance was my scar on my forehead that looked like a bolt of lightning.

Aunt Petunia had told me that I had gotten it in a car crash that had killed my parents and to not ask questions. Do not ask questions. The first rule to living a quiet life with the Dursley's.

Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen as I was turning over the bacon. "Comb your hair!" He barked as a way of morning greeting. About once a week, Uncle Vernon shouted that I needed a haircut. I probably had more haircuts than the rest of the boys in his class put together, but it made no difference, my hair simply grew that way – all over the place.

I was frying eggs by the time Dudley entered the kitchen. Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon. He had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes. And thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head. In short, he looked like a pig in a wig.

I put the plates of egg and bacon on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room. "Thirty-six. That's two less than last year." Dudley was counting his presents.

"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's under this big one from Mommy and Daddy." Aunt Petunia simpered.

"All right, thirty-seven then." Dudley was growing red in the face, a sign of a huge Dudley tantrum coming on. I began wolfing down my breakfast in case Dudley flipped the table over.

Aunt Petunia must have scented danger too, because she quickly added, "And we'll buy you two new presents while we're out today. How's that, popkin? _Two_ more presents. Is that all right?"

Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work for his small brain. "So I'll have thirty…thirty…"

"Thirty-nine, sweetgums," Aunt Petunia said.

"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right, then."

Crisis averted. For now.

"Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like his father. Atta boy, Dudley!" Vernon ruffled Dudley's hair.

The telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it. "Bad news, Vernon. Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't take him."

I did a mental cheer. I should've felt bad for Mrs. Figg, but her house smelled like cabbage and she would make me look at the pictures of every cat she ever owned. It would be at least another year before I saw Tibbles, Mr. Paws, Snowy and Tufty again.

"We could phone Marge." Uncle Vernon suggested.

"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy."

The Dursleys often spoke about me like this, like I wasn't even there.

"What about your friend Yvonne?"

"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.

"You could just leave me here." I put in.

"And come back and find the house in ruins?" Aunt Petunia snarled.

"I won't blow up the house." They weren't listening.

"I suppose we could take him to the zoo…and leave him in the car…" Aunt Petunia said slowly.

"That car's new, he's not sitting in it alone..."

Dudley began to cry loudly. He wasn't really crying but I knew that if Dudley screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would get him anything he wanted.

"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" Petunia cried, flinging her arms around him. "I…don't…him…t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge pretend sobs. "He always sp-spoils everything!" He shot me a nasty grin through his mother's arms.

The doorbell rang. "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" Aunt Petunia frantically dashed off. Moments later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later, I was sitting in the back of the Dursley's car with Piers and Dudley on the way to the zoo for the first time in my life. I couldn't believe my luck.

"I'm warning you, Boy. Any funny business, any at all, and you won't have any meals for a week." Vernon warned me before we left.

"I'm not going to do anything." I said.

Uncle Vernon didn't believe me. No one did.

Strange things just kept happening around me and it was no good telling the Dursley's I didn't make them happen.

Once, Aunt Petunia , tired of me coming back from the barbers looking as though I hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut my hair so short that I was almost bald, except for my bangs, to hide my scar. The next morning, however, I had gotten up only to find that my hair had grown to exactly the way it was before Aunt Petunia sheared it off. I had been given a week in my cupboard for this, even though I couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly.

Another time, Aunt Petunia had tried to force me into a revolting old sweater of Dudley's (brown with orange puff balls). The harder she tried to pull it over my head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a hand puppet, but certainly won't fit me. Aunt Petunia decided it must have shrunk in the wash and I wasn't punished.

On the other hand, I'd gotten into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens. Dudley's gang had been chasing me as usual when, as much to my surprise as anyone else's, there I was sitting on the chimney. The Dursley's had received a very angry letter from my headmistress telling them I'd been climbing school buildings. But all I had tried to do was jump behind the big trash cans outside the kitchen doors. The wind must have caught me mid jump.

Today nothing was going to go wrong. It was even worth being with Dudley and Piers to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, his cupboard or Mrs. Figg's cabbage-smelling living room. On the way, Uncle Vernon complained about to Aunt Petunia. Me, the council, me, the bank, me, people at work and me where just a few of his favorites. Today it was about motorcycles.

I caught snippets of the conversation but I had long learned to tune them out. It was a very sunny and clear Saturday and the zoo was crowded with families. The Dursley's bought large chocolate ice creams at the entrance and because the smiling lady in the van had asked me what I wanted before the Dursley's could hurry me away, they bought me a cheap lemon ice pop.

It wasn't bad either. The right blend of sweet, sour and cold. This was the best morning I had in a long time. I was careful to walk a little way apart from the Dursley's so that Dudley and Piers, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunchtime, wouldn't fall back on their favorite hobby of hitting me.

We ate in the zoo restaurant, and when Dudley had a tantrum because his knickerbocker glory didn't have enough ice cream on top, Uncle Vernon bought him another one and I was allowed to finish the first.

After lunch, we went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes where crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone.

Dudley and Piers had quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped itself twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can – but at the moment didn't look like it was in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.

Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils. "Make it move." Dudley whined. Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge. "Do it again." Dudley ordered. Uncle Vernon rapped on the glass, yet the snake didn't budge.

"This is boring." Dudley complained and shuffled away with Piers.

I moved in front of the tank and looked at the snake. I wouldn't be surprised if it died of boredom. No company but people rapping on the glass all day long. Sort of like Aunt Petunia rapping on his cupboard at the crack of dawn. At least I could visit the rest of the house.

The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Very slowly, it raised its head until it's eyes were level with mine.

 _It winked._

I quickly looked around to see if anyone else was watching. They weren't. I looked back at the snake and winked, too. The snake jerked it's head towards Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised it's eyes towards the ceiling. It gave me a look that said, quite plainly;

" _I get that all the time."_

"I know." I murmured through the glass, though I wasn't sure the snake could hear me. "It must be really annoying."

The snake nodded vigorously.

"Where do you come from anyway?" I asked.

The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass and I read: _Boa Constrictor, Brazil._

"Was it nice there? Did you have a family?" I asked.

The boa constrictor jabbed its tail at the sign again and I read on: _This specimen was bred in the zoo._

"Oh, I see. I never knew my parents either."

A deafening shout made both of us jump. "DUDLEY! MR. DURSELY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

"Out of the way, you." Dudley punched me in the ribs. I fell hard onto the concrete floor. My glasses had fallen down to the bridge of my nose, slightly blurring my vision. I put them back on, to discover that the glass to the Boa Constrictor's tank had vanished. I gasped in surprise.

Piers fell back, screaming like a girl and Dudley actually fell in the tank. The snake slithered down the floor and plain as day spoke to me: "Thankssssss."

"A - Anytime." I replied in a daze. People screamed and ran for the exits as the snake slithered out of the zoo. The glass was back, trapping Dudley inside.

The keeper of the retile house was in shock. "But the glass," he kept saying, "where did the glass go?" The zoo director himself made Aunt Petunia a strong, sweet cup of tea while apologizing over and over again. Piers and Dudley could only gibber. Playing weak and terrified little boys for the whole ride back to Privet Drive.

But worst of all was Piers calming down enough to say, "Harry was talking to it, weren't you, Harry?" Uncle Vernon waited until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on me. Uncle Vernon was so angry he could hardly speak. "Go – Cupboard – Stay – no meals." Before collapsing into a chair and Aunt Petunia had to run and get a large brandy. Incidents like this happened almost on a daily basis, I didn't have any control over it.

I lay in my dark cupboard, wishing I had a watch. I didn't know what time it was and I wasn't sure the Dursley's were asleep yet. Until they were, I couldn't risk sneaking to the kitchen to grab some food. I'd lived with the Dursley's for ten miserable years. As long as he could remember, ever since his parents had died in that car crash.

Sometimes during his dreams, he had strange visions: a blinding flash of green light and a burning pain on his forehead. I couldn't imagine where all that green light had come from. I couldn't remember my parents at all. His aunt and uncle never spoke of them and of course there were no pictures.

When I had been younger, I had dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take me away, but it had never happened. The Dursley's were my only family. Yet sometimes I thought I was greeted by strangers that happened to know me. Very strange they were too. A tiny man in a violet top hat had bowed to me once while out shopping with Aunt Petunia and Dudley. After asking me furiously if I knew the man, Aunt Petunia had rushed out of the shop without buying anything.

A wild looking old woman dressed in all green and wearing (much to my shock) a vulture topped hat had waved to him merrily from a bus. The strangest thing was that nobody else but me could see her. A bald man in a very long purple coat had actually shaken my hand in the street the other day and left without a word. The weirdest thing was the way that they all seemed to vanish the moment I tried to get a closer look. At school, I had no one. Everybody knew that Dudley's gang hated me. With my baggy clothes and broken glasses, I made a perfect target and no one liked to disagree with Dudley's gang.


	3. The Letters From No One

The escape of the Brazilian Boa constrictor had earned my longest ever punishment. By the time I was allowed out of my cupboard, the summer holidays had started. Dudley had already broken his new video camera, crashed his remote-control airplane and knocked down Mrs. Figg with his new racing bike as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.

I was glad school was over, but there was no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited every single day. Piers, Dennis, Malcom and Gordon were all big and stupid, but Dudley was the biggest and stupidest of the lot. That meant Dudley was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in their leader's favorite sport, Harry Hunting.

I spent as much time as I could away from the house. Other kids might dread going back to school, but I was excited. For the first time in my life, I wouldn't be with Dudley. Dudley had been accepted at Smeltings, Uncle Vernon's private school. Piers was attending as well.

I would be attending Stonewall High, the local public school. Dudley thought this was funny. "They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall." He told me. "Want to practice?"

"No thanks. The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it – it might be sick." I ran off before Dudley could work out what I said. One day in July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving me at Mrs. Figg's. Mrs. Figg wasn't as bad as usual. She'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats, and she didn't seem quite as fond of them before. She let me watch television and gave me a piece of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years. Still, I wouldn't complain.

That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smelting's boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers and flat straw hats called bloaters. They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other when the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later in life.

As I looked at Dudley in his new Knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe how Ickle Dudleykins looked so handsome and grown up. I didn't trust myself to speak. I thought two of my ribs had broken from trying not to laugh.

There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when I went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. I went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in gray water.

"What's this?" I asked Aunt Petunia.

Her lips tightened as they did whenever I dared to ask a question. "Your new school uniform." She said.

I looked in the tub again. "I didn't realize it had to be so wet."

"Don't be stupid." Snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dyeing some of Dudley's old things gray for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."

I thought it best not to argue. I was always handed Dudley's old clothes. I was going to look like I was wearing bits of old elephant skin the first day at Stonewall High. Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from my new uniform. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smelting stick, which he carried everywhere on the table.

I heard the click of the mail slot and automatically went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Marge who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and – _A letter for me._

No one had ever written to him. Who would? I had no friends, no other relatives – I didn't belong to the library, so I never got notes asking for the books back. Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake:

 _Mr. H Potter_

 _The Cupboard under the Stairs_

 _4 Privet Drive_

 _Little Whinging_

 _Surrey_

The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald – green ink. There was no stamp. Turning the envelope over, hand and letter trembling, I saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms, a lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding a large letter H.

"Hurry up, Boy!" Shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" Uncle Vernon chuckled at his own joke. I went back to the kitchen, still in staring at the letter. I handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard, sat down and began to slowly open the yellow envelope.

"Dad! Dad, Harry's got something!" The letter was ripped out of my hands by Uncle Vernon.

"That's mine!" I tried to snatch it back.

"Who'd be writing to you?" Sneered Uncle Vernon, shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. Within seconds, it was grayish white.

"P – P – Petunia!" He gasped.

Dudley tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Vernon held it high out of his reach. Aunt Petunia took it and looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise. "Vernon! Oh my goodness – Vernon!"

"Get out, both of you." Uncle Vernon croaked, stuffing the letter back inside it's envelope.

"I want my letter. As it is _mine_."

"Let _me_ see it!" Dudley demanded.

"OUT!" Uncle Vernon roared. He took us buy the scruffs of our necks and threw us into the hall, slamming the kitchen door behind them. I and Dudley had a furious fight over who got to listen at the keyhole, but Dudley, being heavier than I was, won. I cursed the unfairness of the world.

That evening I was moved to Dudley's second bedroom. Everything in there was broken in some way, but it was bigger than my cupboard. I _had_ to get that letter. What followed was nothing short of rebellion. I had trodden on Vernon trying to get the morning mail first. The only thing that was fun about that was the satisfying feeling I got stepping on Vernon's face. I was also looking terrible since I had many bruises for my scuffles. Dudley's tantrums had become nothing but background noise.

Vernon started to nail shut cracks in the window edges and doorways. A letter could slip through, and the letters even came through by hiding in eggs. On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table, looking rather tired and ill, but happy.

"No post on Sundays." Uncle Vernon said cheerfully as he spread marmalade on his newspapers. Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney and caught him smartly on the back of the head. Next moment, a flood of letters came bursting from the fireplace like bullets. I leapt into the air trying to catch one.

Uncle Vernon seized me around the waist and threw me into the hall. Dazed from the impact with the floor, I got up in time to see the door being slammed shut. Letters were still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it." Uncle Vernon was pulling great tufts out of his mustache. "I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

Ten minutes later, I was in the car, speeding towards the highway. Aunt Petunia did'nt dare ask where we were going. Every now and then, Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while. "Shake 'em off…shake 'em off," he would mutter everytime he did this.

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. Dudley's howling was getting tiresome, but I had learned to tune it out. Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy – looking hotel on the outskirts of the big city. I shared a room with twin beds and Dudley, who snored loudly. I stayed awake, sitting on the windowsill, staring down at the lights of passing cars and wondering why the Dursley's seemed so terrified.

I had just finished breakfast, which consisted of stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast, when the owner of the hotel came over to our table. "'Scuse me, but is one of you Mr. H. Potter? Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk." She held up a letter. I made a grab for it but Uncle Vernon knocked my hand out of the way. The woman stared.

"I'll take them." Uncle Vernon stood up quickly and followed her from the dining room.

"Wouldn't it be better to just go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia suggested timidly, hours later, but Uncle Vernon didn't seem to hear her. Today was Monday, which meant tomorrow was my eleventh birthday. Uncle Vernon stopped the car, locked us all inside and got out. While we waited it began to rain, great drops beat on the roof of the car.

Uncle Vernon came back and was smiling. He was carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Petunia when she asked what he'd brought. "Found the perfect place!" Uncle Vernon announced. "Come on! Everyone out!"

It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing out to sea, at a large shack. "Storm forecast for tonight!" Uncle Vernon said gleefully, clapping his hands together. "And this gentlemen's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!" A toothless old man came ambling up, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowboat bobbing in the iron gray water below them.

"I've already got us some ration's so all aboard!" Uncle Vernon said. It was freezing in the boat. Icy rain and rain battered the boat. After what felt like hours, we reached the rock and Uncle Vernon led the way, slipping and sliding, to the shack. I was soaked to the bone and miserable. I should've taken my time and opened my letter at the door that morning.

The shack was drafty, cold and smelled strongly of seaweed. The fireplace was damp and cold. The "rations" as it turned out where bags of chips for each of them and four bananas. As night fell, the storm got even worse. Waves crashed against the rock. Sending spray angainst the walls of the hut and rattling the filthy windows of the hut.

Aunt Petunia found a few moldy blankets and made a nest for Dudley on the moth eaten couch, while Petunia and Vernon went to the lumpy bed next door. I was left with the thinnest and most ragged blanket. The storm raged more and more furiously as the night went on. I couldn't sleep.

I shivered and rolled over, trying to get comfortable. My stomach complained of hunger. Low rolls of thunder had started near midnight, drowning out Dudley's snores. Ten minutes to midnight, by the glow on Dudley's watch. The minutes ticked by.

A noise that sounded like the sea was smashing against the rock made me jump slightly. Maybe a large wave had hit the rock. The sound of crunching made me worry that the sea was going to swallow the rock. Maybe I could cling to a piece of wood and drift to shore?

Ten seconds to go. Nine…eight…seven…six… Maybe I would wake Dudley up, just to annoy him. Three…two…one…BOOM! The whole shack shook from the impact. I sat bolt upright. Someone was trying to come in.


	4. A Hidden World

BOOM! They knocked again. Dudley jerked awake. "Where's the cannon?" he said stupidly. There was a crash behind us and Uncle Vernon appeared, holding a rifle in his hands.

"Who's there?" Uncle Vernon shouted. "I warn you – I'm armed!" There was a pause. Then – SMASH! The door was hit with such force that it swung clean off its hinges and with a deafening crash landed flat on the floor. A giant of a man was standing in the doorway. His face was almost completely hidden by a long, shaggy mane of hair and a wild, tangled beard, but I could make out his eyes, glinting like black beetles under all the hair.

The giant managed to squeeze his way into the hut, stooping so that his head just brushed the ceiling. He bent down, picked up the door and fitted it easily back into its frame. The noise of the storm outside dropped a little. He turned to look at us all.

"Couldn't make us a cup o' tea, could yeh? It's not been an easy journey…" The man strode over to the sofa where Dudley sat frozen in fear. "Budge up, yeh great lump." Said the stranger. Dudley squeaked and ran to hide behind Aunt Petunia, who crouching, terrified behind Uncle Vernon.

"An' here's Harry!" The giant smiled. I suddenly had the impression of a large teddy bear for some reason. "Las's time I saw you, you was only a baby," said the giant. "Yeh look a lot like yer dad, but yeh've got got yer mum's eyes."

Uncle Vernon made a rasping noise. "I demand you leave at once, sir! You are breaking and entering!"

"Ah, shut up, Dursley, yeh great prune." The giant said. He reached over the back of the sofa, jerked the gun out of Uncle Vernon's hands, bent it as if it was made of rubber and threw it into the corner of the room. Uncle Vernon made a squeaking sound. Instantly, I found a new respect for this man. Anyone who could make Uncle Vernon afraid was okay by me.

"Anyway – Harry." The giant said, turning his back on the Dursleys, "a very happy birthday to yeh. Got summat fer yeh here – I mighta sat on it at some point, but it'll taste all right." From and inside pocket of his black overcoat he pulled a slightly squashed box. I opened it with trembling fingers. No one had ever given me a birthday cake before.

Inside was large, sticky chocolate cake with _Happy Birthday Harry_ written on it in green icing. I looked up at the giant, trying to say thank you, but the words lodged in my throat. What I managed to say was, "Who are you?"

The giant chuckled. "True, I haven't introduced meself. Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts." He held out an enormous hand and shook my whole arm. "What about that tea then, eh?" Hagrid said, rubbing his hands together. "I'd not say no ter summat stronger if yeh've got it mind."

Hagrid's eyes fell on the empty grate and he snorted. He bent down over the fireplace and when he drew back, there was a roaring fire there. It filled the whole damp hut with flickering light and I felt the warmth wash over me as though I'd sank into a hot bath.

Hagrid sat back down on the sofa, which sagged under his weight and began to take all sorts of things from the pockets of his cloak. A copper kettle, a squashy package of sausages, a poker, a teapot, several chipped mugs, and a bottle of some amber liquid that he took a swig from before starting to make tea.

I waited while the sausages cooked and the teapot steamed. I couldn't take my eyes off the giant. The giant passed some of the sausages to me and I'd never tasted anything so wonderful. As nobody said anything, I spoke. "I'm sorry, but I really don't know who you are."

"Call me Hagrid, everyone does. An' like I told yeh, I'm Keeper of Keys at Hogwarts. Yeh'll know all about Hogwarts, o' course." Hagrid said.

"Er – No," I said. I had never even heard of Hogwarts before. Hagrid looked shocked. "Sorry." I added.

Hagrid turned to the Dursley's, who shrank back into the shadows. "It's them who should be sorry! I knew yeh weren't getting' yer letters but I never thought yeh wouldn't even know abou' Hogwarts, fer cryin' out loud! Did yeh never wonder where yer parents learned it all?"

"All what?" I asked, feeling lost.

"ALL WHAT?" Hagrid thundered. "Now wait jus' one second!" Hagrid had leapt to his feet. His anger seemed to fill the whole hut, and I was thankful I wasn't on the receiving end of it. The Dursley's where cowering against the wall. "Do you mean ter tell me," Hagrid growled at the Dursleys, "that this boy – this boy! – knows nothin' abou' – about ANYTHING?"

I had been to school and my marks weren't bad. "I know _some_ things. I can do math and stuff."

Hagrid simply waved his hand. "About _our_ world, I mean. _Your_ world. _My_ world. _Yer_ parentsworld _."_

"What world?" I asked. I was on the edge of my seat.

"DURSLEY!" Hagrid boomed.

Hagrid turned from the Dursley and stared at me. "But yeh must know about yer Mom and Dad," Hagrid said. "I mean they're _famous._ You're _famous_."

I stared blankly.

"Yeh don't know…yeh don't know." Hagrid ran his fingers through his hair. "Yeh don't know what yeh _are_?"

Uncle Vernon suddenly found his voice. "Stop! Stop right there, sir! I forbid you to tell the boy anything!" Hagrid gave him a furious look.

"You never told him? Never told him what was in the letter Dumbledore left fer him? I was there! I saw Dumbledore leave it, Dursley! An' you've kept it from him all these years?" Hagrid's every word was trembling with rage.

"Kept _what_ from me?" I asked eagerly.

"STOP, I FORBID YOU!" Uncle Vernon yelled in panic. Aunt Petunia gave a gasp of horror.

"Ah, go boil yer heads, both of yeh." Hagrid said. "Harry – yer a wizard." There was silence in the hut. Only the sea and the whistling wind could be heard.

My mind spun. "I'm a _what?_ "

"A wizard, o' course." Hagrid sat down on the sofa. "an' a good'un, I'd say, once yeh've been trained up a bit. With a mum an' dad like yours, what else would yeh be? An' I reckon it's abou' time yeh read yer letter."

I reached out my hand at last to take the yellowish envelope, addressed in emerald green to Mr. H. Potter, The Floor, Hut-On-The-Rock, The Sea.

Pulling out the letter, I read:

 _Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

 _Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore_

 _(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)_

 _Dear Mr. Potter,_

 _We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins September 1_ _st_ _. We await your owl by no later than July 31_ _st_ _._

 _Yours sincerely,_

 _Minerva McGonagall_

 _Deputy Headmistress_

Questions exploded in my mind like fireworks. I managed to ask, "What does it mean, they await my owl?"

"Gallopin' Gorgons, that reminds me." Hagrid clapped a hand to his forehead with enough force to knock over a cart horse, and yet from another pocket, he pulled out an owl. A real, live, rather ruffled looking owl, a long quill and a roll of parchment. He scribbled a note that I could read upside down:

 _Dear Professor Dumbledore,_

 _Given Harry his letter._

 _Taking him to buy his things tomorrow._

 _Weather's horrible. Hope you're well._

 _Hagrid_

Hagrid rolled up the note, gave it to the owl, which clamped it in it's beak, went to the door, and threw the owl into the storm. Hagrid sat down as if this was all normal. I blinked, realizing I had been staring.

Uncle Vernon moved into the firelight. "He's not going."

Hagrid snorted. "I'd like to see a great Muggle like you stop him."

"A what?" I asked.

"It's what we call non-magic folk like them. An' it's your own bad luck you grew up in a family o' the biggest Muggles I ever laid eyes on." Hagrid explained.

"We swore when we took him in we'd put a stop to that rubbish, swore we'd stamp it out of him! Wizard indeed!" Uncle Vernon shouted.

"You _knew_?" I asked. Feeling angry again. "You _knew_ I'm a wizard?"

"Knew!" Shrieked Aunt Petunia suddenly. "Of course we knew! How could you not be, my dratted sister being what she was? Oh, she got a letter just like that and disappeared off to that – that _school_ – and came home every vacation with her pockets full of frog spawn, turning teacups into rats. I was the only one who saw her for what she was – a freak! But my mother and father, no, it was Lily this, Lily that, they were proud of having a witch in the family!" Aunt Petunia stopped to take a breath and went on. It was like she was wanting to say this for years. "Then she met that Potter at school and they left and got married and had you, and of course I knew that you'd be just the same, just as strange, just as abnormal, and then she got herself blown up and we got landed with you!"

"You told me they died in a car crash!" I found myself trembling with rage.

"CAR CRASH!" Hagrid roared, jumping up so angrily that the Dursley's scuttled back into their corner. "How could a car crash kill Lily an' James Potter? It's an outrage! A scandal! Harry Potter not knowin' his own story when every kid in our world knows his name!"

"What story?" I asked.

The anger faded from Hagrid's face. "I never expected this." He said in a low, worried voice. "I had no idea, when Dumbledore told me there might be trouble getting' hold of yeh, how much yeh didn't know. Ah, Harry, I don' know if I'm the right person ter tell yeh – but someone's gotta – yeh can't go off ter Hogwarts not knowin'." Hagrid threw a dirty look at the Dursley's.

"Well, it's best yeh know as much as I can tell yeh – mind, I can't tell yeh everythin', it's a great myst'ry parts of it…" Hagrid sat down, gazing into the fire. "It begins, I suppose, with – with a person called – but it's incredible yeh don't know his name, everyone in our world knows." Hagrid shuddered. "Gulpin' gargoyles, Harry, people are still scared. Blimey, this is difficult. See, there was this wizard who went …bad. As bad as you could go. Worse. Worse than worse. His name was…" Hagrid gulped, but no words came out.

"Could you write it down?" I asked.

"Nah – can't spell it. All right – Voldemort." Hagrid shuddered. "Don' make me say it again. Anyway, this – this wizard, about twenty years ago now, started lookin' fer followers. Got' em, too – some were afraid, some just wanted a bit o' his power, 'cuase he was getting' himself power, all right. Dark days, Harry. Didn't know who ter trust, didn't dare get friendly with strange wizards or witches…terrible things happened. He was takin' over. 'Course, some stood up to him – an' he killed 'em. Horribly. One o' the only safe places left was Hogwarts. Reckon Dumbledore's the only one You-Know-Who was afraid of. Didn't dare try takin' the school, not jus' then, anyway."

"Now, yer mum an' dad were as good a witch an' wizard as I ever knew. Head Boy an' girl at Hogwarts in their day! Suppose the myst'ry is why You- Know-Who never tried to get 'em on his side before…probably knew they were too close ter Dumbledore ter want anythin' ter do with the Dark Side. Maybe he thought he could persuade 'em…maybe he just wanted 'em outta the way. All anyone knows is, he turned up in the village where you was all living, on Halloween ten years ago. You were just a year old. He came ter yer house an' – an' –"

Hagrid pulled out a very dirty, spotted handkerchief and blew his nose with sound like a foghorn.

"Sorry," he said. "But it's that sad – knew yer mum an' dad an' nicer people yeh couldn't find – anyway… You-Know-Who killed 'em. An' then – an' this is the real mystery of the thing – he tried to kill you, too. Wanted ter make a clean job of it, I suppose, or maybe he just like killin' by then. But he couldn't do it. Never wondered how you got that mark on yer forehead? That was no ordinary cut. That's what yeh get when a powerful, evil curse touches yeh – took care of yer mum an' dad an' yer house even – but it didn't work on you, an that's why yer famous, Harry. No one lived after he decided ter kill 'em, no one except you, an' he killed some o' the best witches an' wizards of the age – the McKinnons, the Bones, the Prewetts – an' you was only a baby, an' you lived."

As Hagrid's story came to a close, I saw again the blinding flash of green light and, for the first time, a high, cold, cruel laugh.

Hagrid was watching me sadly.

"Took yeh from the ruined house myself, on Dumbledore's orders. Brought yeh ter this lot…"

"Load of old tosh." Uncle Vernon interrupted. His fists where clenched and was glaring at Hagrid. I wondered how far Hagrid could throw Uncle Vernon.

"Now, you listen here, boy," Vernon snarled, "I accept there's something strange about you, probably nothing a good beating wouldn't have cured – and as for all this about your parents, well, they were weirdos, no denying it, and the world's better off without them in my opinion – asked for all they got, getting mixed up with these wizarding types – just what I expected, always knew they'd come to a sticky end – "

Hagrid leapt from the sofa and drew a battered pink umbrella from inside his coat. Pointing it at Vernon like a sword, he said. "I'm warning you, Durseley, one more word…" In danger of being skewered, Uncle Vernon flattened himself against the wall and fell silent. 'That's better." Hagrid sat back down.

"But what happened to Vol-, sorry – I mean, You-Know-Who?"

"Good question, Harry. Disappeared. Vanished. Same night he tried ter kill you. Makes yeh even more famous. That's the biggest myst'ry see…he was gettin' more an' more powerful – why'd he go? Some say he died. Codswallop, in my opinion. Dunno if he had any human left in him to die. Some say he's still out there, bidin' his time, like, but I don' believe it. People who were on his side came back ter ours. Some of 'em came outta kinda trances. Don't reckon they could've done if he was coming back. Most of us reckon he's still out there somewhere but lost his powers. Too weak to carry on. 'Cause something about you finished him, Harry. There was somethin' going on that night he had'nt counted on."

How could I be a wizard? I'd spent my life being clouted by Dudley, and bullied by Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia. If I was really a wizard, why hadn't they been turned into warty toads every time they'd tried to lock him in his cupboard? If I once defeated the greatest sorcerer in the world, how come Dudley had always been able to kick me around like a football?

"Hagrid" I said quietly. "I think you must have made a mistake. I don't think I can be a wizard."

Hagrid chuckled. "Not a wizard, eh? Never made things happen when you were scared or angry?"

I looked into the fire. Come to think of it…every odd thing that had ever made his aunt and uncle furious with him had happened when I was upset or angry…chased by Dudley's gang, hadn't I always found myself out of their reach? Dreading going to school with that ridiculous haircut, hadn't I managed to grow it back? The last time Dudley had hit me, had'nt I got my revenge by setting a boa constrictor on him? Hadn't the snake _talked_ to me?

I looked at Hagrid, who was now beaming.

"See?" Hagrid said. "Harry Potter, not a wizard – you wait, you'll be right famous at Hogwarts."

"Haven't I told you he's not going?" Uncle Vernon hissed. "He's going to Stonewall High and he'll be grateful for it. I've read those letters and he needs all sorts of rubbish – spell books and wands and – "

"If he wants to go, a great Muggle like you won't stop him." Hagrid growled. "Stop Lily an' James Potter's son goin' ter Hogwarts! Yer mad. His name's been down ever since he was born. He's off ter the finest school of witchcraft and wizardry in the world. Seven years there and he won't know himself. He'll be with youngsters of his own sort, fer a change, an' he'll be under the greatest headmaster Hogwarts ever had, Albus Dumbled-"

"I AM NOT PAYING SOME CRACKPOT OLD FOOL TO TEACH HIM MAGIC TRICKS!" Uncle Vernon yelled.

"NEVER INSULT ALBUS DUMBLEDORE IN FRONT OF ME!" Hagrid roared. Uncle Vernon had finally gone too far. Hagrid's umbrella swished out from his coat to point at Dudley. There was a flash of violet light, a sound like a firecracker and a squeal.

Dudely was dancing on the spot with his hands clasped on his fat bottom, howling in pain. When he turned his back, I saw a curly pigs tail poking through a hole in his trousers. I could'nt help but grin at Dudley's misfortune. In my opinion, the pig tail was an improvement. Uncle Vernon roared, pulling Aunt Petunia and Dudley into the other room, he cast one last terrified look at Hagrid and slammed the door behind them.

Hagrid looked down at the umbrella and stroked his beard. "Shouldn'ta lost my temper." Hagrid said ruefully, "but it did'nt work anyway. Meant ter turn him into a pig, but I suppose he was so much like a pig there wasn't much left ter do." He cast a sideways glance at me.

"Be grateful if yeh didn't mention that ter anyone at Hogwarts. I'm – er – not supposed ter do magic, strictly speakin'. I was allowed ter do a bit ter follow yeh an' get yer letters to yeh an' stuff – one o' the reasons I was so keen ter take on the job – "

"Why aren't you supposed to do magic?" I asked.

"Oh, well – I was at Hogwarts meself but I – er – got expelled, ter tell yeh the truth. In me third year. They snapped me wand in half an' everything. But Dumbledore let me stay on as gamekeeper. Great man, Dumbledore." Hagrid held his umbrella tightly.

"Why were you expelled?" I asked.

"It's gettin' late and we've got lots ter do tomorrow." Hagrid announced loudly. "Gotta get up ter town, get all yer books an' that."

He took off his thick black coat and threw it to me. "You can kip under that." Hagrid said. "Don' mind if it wiggles a bit, I think I still got a couple o' dormice in one o' the pockets."

I used Hagrid's coat as a blanket and instantly fell asleep. I awoke early the next morning. It was daylight, but I kept my eyes closed. "It was dream." I told myself. "I dreamed a giant called Hagrid came to tell me I was going to a school for wizards. When I open my eyes, I'll be back in my cupboard." There was a loud tapping noise.

 _And there's Aunt Petunia knocking on the door._

I didn't want to open my eyes. It had been such a good dream.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

"All right." I mumbled. "I'm getting up."

I sat up and Hagrid's coat fell off me. The smell of the sea wafted into the hut. The storm was over. Hagrid himself was asleep on the collapsed sofa, the fire having gone out. There was an owl rapping it's claw on the window, a newspaper held in its beak.

Last night was not a dream. I scrambled to my feet, feeling light. Opening the window, the owl swooped in and dropped the newspaper on top of Hagrid, who didn't wake up. The owl then fluttered over to Hagrid's coat and began to attack it.

"Don't do that." The owl gave me a cross look and carried on savaging the coat.

"Hagrid!" I called, loudly. "There's an owl – "

"Pay him fer deliverin' the paper. Look in the pockets." Hagrid grunted into the sofa.

Hagrid's coat seemed to be made of nothing _but_ pockets – bunches of keys, slug pellets, balls of string, peppermint humbugs, teabags…finally I pulled out a handful of strange-looking coins.

"Give him five Knuts." Hagrid said sleepily.

"Knuts?" I asked. Which one was that?

"The little bronze ones."

I counted out five little bronze coins and the owl held out his leg, so I could put the money into a small leather pouch tied to it. Then the owl flew off through the open window. Hagrid yawned widely, sat up and stretched. "Best be off , Harry, lots ter do today, gotta get up ter London an' buy all yer stuff fer school."

I was turning over the wizard coins and looking at them. I had a sinking feeling.

"Um – Hagrid? I – I have'nt got any money – and you heard uncle Vernon last night…he won't pay for me to go and learn magic."

'Don't worry about that. D'yeh think yer parents didn't leave yeh anything?" Hagrid began cooking some sausages and relit the fire.

"But if their house was destroyed – "

"They didn' keep their gold in the house. Nah, first stop for us is Gringotts. Wizard's bank. Have a sausage." Hagrid handed me one.

"Wizards have banks?" I asked.

"Just the one. Gringotts. Run by goblins."

I nearly dropped the sausage I was holding. " _Goblins_?"

"Yeah – so yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it, I'll tell yeh that. Never mess with goblins, Harry. Gringotts is the safest place in the world fer anything yeh want to keep safe – 'cept maybe Hogwarts. As a matter o' fact, I gotta visit Gringotts anyway, Hogwarts business." Hagrid drew himself up proudly. "He usually gets me ter do important stuff fer him. Knows he can trust me, see. Come on, then."

I followed Hagrid out onto the rock. The sky was quite clear now and the sea gleamed in the sunlight. I did'nt see another boat, besides the one Uncle Vernon hired last night.

"How did you get here?" I asked.

"Flew." Hagrid answered. "We'll go back in this. Not s'pposed ter use magic now I've got yeh."

I settled down on the boat, trying to imagine Hagrid flying.

"If I was ter – er – speed things up a bit, would yeh mind not mentionin' it at Hogwarts?" Hagrid asked.

I grinned, eager to see more magic. "Of course not."

Hagrid brought out the pink umbrella again, tapped it twice against the side of the boat and we sped off towards land. Hagrid sat and read his newspaper, the _Daily Prophet._ "Ministry of Magic messin' things up as usual." Hagrid muttered turning the page.

"There's a Ministry of Magic?" I asked, before I could stop myself. Uncle Vernon liked reading the newspaper in silence.

"Course." Hagrid said. "They wanted Dumbledore fer Minister, o' course, but he'd never leave Hogwarts, so old Cornelius Fudge got the job. Bungler if ever there was one. So he pelts Dumbledore with owls every morning, askin' fer advice."

"What does the Ministry of Magic do?" I asked.

"Well, their main job is to keep it from Muggles that there's still wizards an' witches up an' down the country. Everyone'd be wantin' magic solutions to their problems. Nah, we're best left alone."

The boat gently bumped into the harbor wall. Hagrid folded up his newspaper and we clambered up the stone steps onto the streets. Passerby stared at Hagrid as we walked, not that I could blame them. Hagrid was twice as tall as anyone else.

At the station, I had to buy the tickets, because Hagrid didn't understand "muggle money" as he called it. A thought flew into my mind. "Hagrid, there aren't dragons are there?"

Hagrid grinned. "Course, there are. Crikey, I'd like a dragon."

"You'd _like_ a dragon?"

"Vastly misunderstood beasts, Harry. Vastly misunderstood. Wanted one ever since I was a kid. Here we go." We had reached the station in London.

"There's a list of everything yeh need on yer letter." Hagrid said. I opened my letter again and unfolded a second piece of paper I hadn't noticed the night before:

 _Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

 _Uniform_

 _First year students will require:_

 _Three sets of plain work robes (black)_

 _One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear_

 _One pair of protective gloves (dragonhide or similar)_

 _One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)_

 _Please note that all pupil's clothes should carry name tags._

 _Course Books_

 _All students should have a copy of each of the following:_

 _The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk_

 _A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot_

 _Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling_

 _A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch_

 _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore_

 _Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger_

 _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander_

 _The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble_

 _Other Equipment:_

 _1 wand_

 _1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)_

 _1 set glass or crystal phials_

 _1 telescope_

 _1 set brass scales_

 _Students may also bring an owl OR a cat OR a toad._

 _PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS_

"Can we buy all this in London?" I asked Hagrid.

"If yeh know where to go." Hagrid said.

I had never been to London before, though Hagrid seemed to know where he was going. We passed bookshops, music store, hamburger restrants and cinemas, but nowhere that looked as if it could sell you a magic wand. An ordinary street filled with ordinary people.

Hagrid suddenly came to halt. "This is it. The Leaky Cauldron. It's a famous place."

It was a tiny, grubby- looking pub. If Hagrid hadn't pointed it out, I wouldn't have noticed it was there. The people hurrying buy didn't even glance at it. Their eyes slid from the record shop on one side to the big bookstore on the other, as if the Leaky Cauldron wasn't even there.

" _Magic."_ I thought.

For a famous place, it was dark and shabby inside. A few old women were sitting in a corner, drinking tiny glasses of sherry. One of them was smoking a long pipe. A little man in a top hat was talking to the old bartender, who was quite bald and looked like toothless walnut. The low buzz of chatter stopped when they walked in.

Everyone seemed to know Hagrid; they waved and smiled at him, and the bartender reached for a glass, saying, "The usual Hagrid?"

"Can't Tom, I'm on Hogwarts business." Hagrid said, clapping a hand on my shoulder and making my knees buckle.

"Good Lord." Said the bartender, peering at me. "Is this – can this be - ?"

The Leaky Cauldron had suddenly gone very still and silent.

"Bless my soul," whispered the old bartender, "Harry Potter…what an honor." He hurried out from behind the bar and seized my hand, tears in his eyes. "Welcome back, Mr. Potter, welcome back."

I didn't know what to say. Everyone was looking at me. Hagrid was beaming. Then there was a great scraping of chairs and the next moment, I found myself shaking hands with everyone in the Leaky Cauldron.

"Doris Crockford, Mr. Potter, can't believe I'm meeting you at last."

I shook hands, names and faces blending together. I think I met everyone that was in the Leaky Cauldron.

A pale young man made his way forward, very nervously. One of his eyes was twitching.

"Professor Quirrell!" said Hagrid. "Harry, Professor Quirrell will be one of your teachers at Hogwarts."

"P-P-Potter," stammered Professor Quirrell, grasping Harry's hand, "c-can't t-tell you how p- pleased I am to meet you."

"What sort of magic do you teach, Professor Quirrell?"

"D-Defense Against the D-D-Dark Arts," muttered Professor Quirrell, as though he'd rather not think about it. "N-not that you n-need it, eh, P-P-Potter?" He laughed nervously. "You'll be g-getting all your equipment, I suppose? I've g-got to p-pick up a new b-book on vampires, m-myself." He looked terrified at the very thought.

It took almost ten minutes to get away from the crowd. At last, Hagrid managed to make himself heard over the babble.

"Must get on - lots ter buy. Come on, Harry." Hagrid led me through the bar and out into a small, walled courtyard, where there was nothing but a trash can and a few weeds.

Hagrid grinned.

"Told yeh, didn't I? Told yeh you was famous. Even Professor Quirrell was tremblin' ter meet yeh - mind you, he's usually tremblin'."

"Is he always that nervous?" I asked. Felling rather winded. I took a few breaths.

"Oh, yeah. Poor bloke. Brilliant mind. He was fine while he was studyin' outta books but then he took a year off ter get some firsthand experience... They say he met vampires in the Black Forest, and there was a nasty bit o' trouble with a hag - never been the same since. Scared of the students, scared of his own subject now, where's me umbrella?"

Vampires? Hags? My head was swimming.

"Three up... two across." Hagrid muttered. "Right, stand back, Harry."

He tapped the wall three times with the point of his umbrella.

The brick he had touched quivered - it wriggled - in the middle, a small hole appeared - it grew wider and wider - a second later we were facing an archway large enough even for Hagrid, an archway onto a cobbled street that twisted and turned out of sight.

"Welcome, Harry." said Hagrid, "to Diagon Alley."

He grinned at my amazement. We stepped through the archway. I looked quickly over my shoulder and saw the archway shrink instantly back into solid wall.

The sun shone brightly on a stack of cauldrons outside the nearest shop. Cauldrons - All Sizes - Copper, Brass, Pewter, Silver - Self-Stirring - Collapsible, said a sign hanging over them.

"Yeah, you'll be needin' one," said Hagrid, "but we gotta get yer money first."

I wished I had about eight more eyes. I turned my head in every direction as they walked up the street, trying to look at everything at once: the shops, the things outside them, the people doing their shopping. A plump woman outside an Apothecary was shaking her head as they passed, saying, "Dragon liver, seventeen Sickles an ounce, they're mad..."

A low, soft hooting came from a dark shop with a sign saying Eeylops Owl Emporium - Tawny, Screech, Barn, Brown, and Snowy. Several boys of about my age had their noses pressed against a window with broomsticks in it. "Look, the new Nimbus Two Thousand - fastest ever -"

There were shops selling robes, shops selling telescopes and strange silver instruments I had never seen before, windows stacked with barrels of bat spleens and eels' eyes, tottering piles of spell books, quills, and rolls of parchment, potion bottles, globes of the moon...

"Gringotts," said Hagrid.

We had reached a snowy white building that towered over the other little shops. Standing beside its burnished bronze doors, wearing a uniform of scarlet and gold, was…

"Yeah, that's a goblin," said Hagrid quietly as they walked up the white stone steps toward him. The goblin was about a head shorter than me. He had a swarthy, clever face, a pointed beard and, I noticed, very long fingers and feet. The goblin bowed as we walked inside. Now we faced a second pair of doors, silver this time, with words engraved upon them:

 _Enter, stranger, but take heed_

 _Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

 _For those who take, but do not earn,_

 _Must pay most dearly in their turn._

 _So if you seek beneath our floors_

 _A treasure that was never yours,_

 _Thief, you have been warned, beware_

 _Of finding more than treasure there._

"Like I said, Yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it," said Hagrid.

A pair of goblins bowed them through the silver doors and they were in a vast marble hall. About a hundred more goblins were sitting on high stools behind a long counter, scribbling in large ledgers, weighing coins in brass scales, examining precious stones through eyeglasses. There were too many doors to count leading off the hall, and yet more goblins were showing people in and out of these. I followed Hagrid as he made for the counter.

"Morning," said Hagrid to a free goblin. "We've come ter take some money outta Mr. Harry Potter's trust."

"You have his key, Sir?"

"Got it here somewhere," said Hagrid, and he started emptying his pockets onto the counter, scattering a handful of moldy dog biscuits over the goblin's book of numbers. The goblin wrinkled his nose. I watched the goblin on their right weighing a pile of rubies as big as glowing coals.

"Got it," said Hagrid at last, holding up a tiny golden key.

The goblin looked at it closely.

"That seems to be in order."

"An' I've also got a letter here from Professor Dumbledore," said Hagrid importantly, throwing out his chest. "It's about the You-Know-What in vault seven hundred and thirteen."

The goblin read the letter carefully.

"Very well," he said, handing it back to Hagrid, "I will have Someone take you down to both vaults. Griphook!"

Griphook was yet another goblin. Once Hagrid had crammed all the dog biscuits back inside his pockets, we followed Griphook toward one of the doors leading off the hall.

"What's the You-Know-What in vault seven hundred and thirteen?" I asked.

"Can't tell yeh that," said Hagrid mysteriously. "Very secret. Hogwarts business. Dumbledore's trusted me. More'n my job's worth ter tell yeh that."

Griphook held the door open for them. They were now in a narrow stone passageway lit with flaming torches. It sloped steeply downward and there were little railway tracks on the floor. Griphook whistled and a small cart came hurtling up the tracks toward them. We climbed in - Hagrid with some difficulty - and were off.

At first they just hurtled through a maze of twisting passages. I tried to remember, left, right, right, left, middle fork, right, left, but it was impossible. The rattling cart seemed to know its own way, because Griphook wasn't steering.

My eyes stung as the cold air rushed past them, but I kept them wide open. Once, I thought I saw a burst of fire at the end of a passage and twisted around to see if it was a dragon, but too late - they plunged even deeper, passing an underground lake where huge stalactites and stalagmites grew from the ceiling and floor.

I never know," I called to Hagrid over the noise of the cart, "what's the difference between a stalagmite and a stalactite?"

"Stalagmite's got an 'm' in it," said Hagrid. "An' don' ask me questions just now, I think I'm gonna be sick."

He did look very green, and when the cart stopped at last beside a small door in the passage wall, Hagrid got out and had to lean against the wall to stop his knees from trembling.

Griphook unlocked the door. A lot of green smoke came billowing out, and as it cleared, I gasped. Inside were piles of gold coins. Columns of silver. Heaps of little bronze Knuts.

"All yours," smiled Hagrid.

All Harry's - it was incredible. The Dursleys couldn't have known about this or they'd have had it from him faster than blinking. How often had they complained how much Harry cost them to keep? And all the time there had been a small fortune belonging to him, buried deep under London.

Hagrid helped me pile some of it into a bag.

"The gold ones are Galleons," he explained. "Seventeen silver Sickles to

a Galleon and twenty-nine Knuts to a Sickle, it's easy enough. Right, that should be enough fer a couple o' terms, we'll keep the rest safe for yeh." He turned to Griphook. "Vault seven hundred and thirteen now, please, and can we go more slowly?"

"One speed only," said Griphook.

We were going even deeper now and gathering speed. The air became colder and colder as we hurtled round tight corners. Rattling over an underground ravine, I leaned over the side to try to see what was down at the dark bottom, but Hagrid groaned and pulled me back by the scruff of his neck.

Vault seven hundred and thirteen had no keyhole.

"Stand back," said Griphook importantly. He stroked the door gently with one of his long fingers and it simply melted away.

"If anyone but a Gringotts goblin tried that, they'd be sucked through the door and trapped in there," said Griphook.

"How often do you check to see if anyone's inside?" I asked.

"About once every ten years," said Griphook with a rather nasty grin.

Something really extraordinary had to be inside this top security vault, I was sure, and I leaned forward eagerly, expecting to see fabulous jewels at the very least - but at first I thought it was empty. Then I noticed a grubby little package wrapped up in brown paper lying on the floor. Hagrid picked it up and tucked it deep inside his coat. I longed to know what it was, but knew better than to ask.

"Come on, back in this infernal cart, and don't talk to me on the way back, it's best if I keep me mouth shut," said Hagrid.

One wild cart ride later, we stood blinking in the sunlight outside Gringotts. I didn't know where to run first now that I had a bag full of money. I didn't have to know how many Galleons there were to a pound to know that I was holding more money than I'd had in my whole life - more money than even Dudley had ever had.

"Might as well get yer uniform," said Hagrid, nodding toward Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. "Listen, Harry, would yeh mind if I slipped off fer a pick-me-up in the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts." He did still look a bit sick, so I entered Madam Malkin's shop alone, feeling nervous.

Madam Malkin was a squat, smiling witch dressed all in mauve.

"Hogwarts, clear?" she said, when I started to speak. "Got the lot here - another young man being fitted up just now, in fact. "

In the back of the shop, a boy with a pale, pointed face was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up his long black robes. Madam Malkin stood Harry on a stool next to me, slipped a long robe over my head, and began to pin it to the right length.

"Hello," said the boy, "Hogwarts, too?"

"Yes," I said.

"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands," said the boy. He had a bored, drawling voice. "Then I'm going to drag them off to took at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow."

I was strongly reminded of Dudley.

"Have you got your own broom?" the boy went on.

"No."

"Play Quidditch at all?"

"No." I said again, wondering what on earth Quidditch could be.

"I do - Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"

"No." I was feeling more stupid by the minute.

"Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been - imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?"

"Mmm," I wished I could say something a bit more interesting.

"I say, look at that man!" said the boy suddenly, nodding toward the front window. Hagrid was standing there, grinning at Harry and pointing at two large ice creams to show he couldn't come in.

"That's Hagrid," I said, pleased to know something the boy didn't. "He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh," said the boy, "I've heard of him. He's a sort of servant, isn't he?"

"He's the gamekeeper," I was liking the boy less and less every second.

"Yes, exactly. I heard he's a sort of savage - lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic, and ends up setting fire to his bed."

"I think he's brilliant," I said coldly.

"Do you?" said the boy, with a slight sneer. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead," I didn't feel much like going into the matter with this boy.

"Oh, sorry," said the boy, not sounding sorry at all. "But they were our kind, weren't they?"

"They were a witch and wizard, if that's what you mean."

"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same, they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What's your surname, anyway?"

But before I could answer, Madam Malkin said, "That's you done, my dear," and Harry, not sorry for an excuse to stop talking to the boy, hopped down from the footstool.

"Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose," said the drawling boy.

I was rather quiet as I ate the ice cream Hagrid had bought me (chocolate and raspberry with chopped nuts).

"What's up?" said Hagrid.

"Nothing," I lied. They stopped to buy parchment and quills. I cheered up a bit when I found a bottle of ink that changed color as you wrote. When they had left the shop, I asked, "Hagrid, what's Quidditch?"

"Blimey, Harry, I keep forgettin' how little yeh know - not knowin' about Quidditch!"

"Don't make me feel worse." I told Hagrid about the pale boy in Madam Malkin's.

"-and he said people from Muggle families shouldn't even be allowed in."

"Yer not from a Muggle family. If he'd known who yeh were - he's grown up knowin' yer name if his parents are wizardin' folk. You saw what everyone in the Leaky Cauldron was like when they saw yeh. Anyway, what does he know about it, some o' the best I ever saw were the only ones with magic in 'em in a long line o' Muggles - look at yer mum! Look what she had fer a sister!"

"So what is Quidditch?"

"It's our sport. Wizard sport. It's like - like soccer in the Muggle world - everyone follows Quidditch - played up in the air on broomsticks and there's four balls - sorta hard ter explain the rules."

"And what are Slytherin and Hufflepuff?"

"School houses. There's four. Everyone says Hufflepuff are a lot o' duffers, but -"

"I bet I'm in Hufflepuff" I said gloomily.

"Better Hufflepuff than Slytherin," said Hagrid darkly. "There's not a single witch or wizard who went bad who wasn't in Slytherin. You-Know-Who was one."

"Vol-, sorry - You-Know-Who was at Hogwarts?"

"Years an' years ago," said Hagrid.

We bought my school books in a shop called Flourish and Blotts where the shelves were stacked to the ceiling with books as large as paving stones bound in leather; books the size of postage stamps in covers of silk; books full of peculiar symbols and a few books with nothing in them at all. Even Dudley, who never read anything, would have been wild to get his hands on some of these. Hagrid almost had to drag me away from Curses and Countercurses (Bewitch Your Friends and Befuddle Your Enemies with the Latest Revenges: Hair Loss, Jelly-Legs, Tongue- Tying and Much, Much More) by Professor Vindictus Viridian.

"I was trying to find out how to curse Dudley."

"I'm not sayin' that's not a good idea, but yer not ter use magic in the Muggle world except in very special circumstances," said Hagrid. "An' anyway, yeh couldn' work any of them curses yet, yeh'll need a lot more study before yeh get ter that level."

Hagrid wouldn't let me buy a solid gold cauldron, either ("It says pewter on yer list"), but we got a nice set of scales for weighing potion ingredients and a collapsible brass telescope. Then we visited the Apothecary, which was fascinating enough to make up for its horrible smell, a mixture of bad eggs and rotted cabbages. Barrels of slimy stuff stood on the floor; jars of herbs, dried roots, and bright powders lined the walls; bundles of feathers, strings of fangs, and snarled claws hung from the ceiling. While Hagrid asked the man behind the counter for a supply of some basic potion ingredients, I examined silver unicorn horns at twenty-one Galleons each and minuscule, glittery-black beetle eyes (five Knuts a scoop).

Outside the Apothecary, Hagrid checked my list again.

"Just yer wand left - A yeah, an' I still haven't got yeh a birthday present."

I felt myself go red.

"You don't have to -"

"I know I don't have to. Tell yeh what, I'll get yer animal. Not a toad, toads went outta fashion years ago, yeh'd be laughed at - an' I don' like cats, they make me sneeze. I'll get yer an owl. All the kids want owls, they're dead useful, carry yer mail an' everythin'."

Twenty minutes later, we left Eeylops Owl Emporium, which had been dark and full of rustling and flickering, jewel-bright eyes. I now carried a large cage that held a beautiful snowy owl, fast asleep with her head under her wing. I couldn't stop stammering my thanks, sounding just like Professor Quirrell.

"Don' mention it," said Hagrid gruffly. "Don' expect you've had a lotta presents from them Dursleys. Just Ollivanders left now - only place fer wands, Ollivanders, and yeh gotta have the best wand."

A magic wand... this was what I had been really looking forward to.

The last shop was narrow and shabby. Peeling gold letters over the door read, Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C. A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty window.

A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as we stepped inside. It was a tiny place, empty except for a single, spindly chair that Hagrid sat on to wait. I felt strangely as though I had entered a very strict library; I swallowed a lot of new questions that had just occurred, and looked instead at the thousands of narrow boxes piled neatly right up to the ceiling. For some reason, the back of my neck prickled. The very dust and silence in here seemed to tingle with some secret magic.

"Good afternoon," said a soft voice. I jumped. Hagrid must have jumped, too, because there was a loud crunching noise and he got quickly off the spindly chair.

An old man was standing, his wide, pale eyes shining like moons through the gloom of the shop.

"Hello," I said awkwardly.

"Ah yes," said the man. "Yes, yes. I thought I'd be seeing you soon. Harry Potter." It wasn't a question. "You have your mother's eyes. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice wand for charm work."

Mr. Ollivander moved closer to Harry. I wished he would blink. Those silvery eyes were a bit creepy.

"Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I say your father favored it - it's really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course."

Mr. Ollivander had come so close that they were almost nose to nose. I could see myself reflected in those misty eyes.

"And that's where..."

Mr. Ollivander touched the lightning scar on my forehead with a long, white finger.

"I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did it," he said softly. "Thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands... well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into the world to do..."

He shook his head and then, to Harry's relief, spotted Hagrid.

"Rubeus! Rubeus Hagrid! How nice to see you again... Oak, sixteen inches, rather bendy, wasn't it?"

"It was, sir, yes," said Hagrid.

"Good wand, that one. But I suppose they snapped it in half when you got expelled?" said Mr. Ollivander, suddenly stern.

"Er - yes, they did, yes," said Hagrid, shuffling his feet. "I've still got the pieces, though," he added brightly.

"But you don't use them?" said Mr. Ollivander sharply.

"Oh, no, sit," said Hagrid quickly. I noticed he gripped his pink umbrella very tightly as he spoke.

"Hmmm," said Mr. Ollivander, giving Hagrid a piercing look. "Well, now - Mr. Potter. Let me see." He pulled a long tape measure with silver markings out of his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?"

"Er - well, I'm right-handed."

"Hold out your arm. That's it." He measured me from shoulder to finger, then wrist to elbow, shoulder to floor, knee to armpit and round my head.

As he measured, he said, "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Mr. Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers, and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons, or phoenixes are quite the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another wizard's wand."

I suddenly realized that the tape measure, which was measuring between my nostrils, was doing this on its own. Mr. Ollivander was flitting around the shelves, taking down boxes.

"That will do," he said, and the tape measure crumpled into a heap on the floor. "Right then, Mr. Potter. Try this one. Beechwood and dragon heartstring. Nine inches. Nice and flexible. just take it and give it a wave."

I took the wand and (feeling foolish) waved it around a bit, but Mr. Ollivander snatched it out of my hand almost at once.

"Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy. Try -"

I tried – but I had hardly raised the wand when it, too, was snatched back by Mr. Ollivander.

"No, no -here, ebony and unicorn hair, eight and a half inches, springy. Go on, go on, try it out."

I tried. And tried. I had no idea what Mr. Ollivander was waiting for. The pile of tried wands was mounting higher and higher on the spindly chair, but the more wands Mr. Ollivander pulled from the shelves, the happier he seemed to become.

"Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we'll find the perfect match here somewhere…I wonder, now…yes, why not…unusual combination…holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."

I took the wand. Only for a high-pitched whistle to escape from the end of the wand, like a teapot.

Ollivander snatched it out of my hand.

"Wand wood incapability." Ollivander muttered.

The old man rummaged behind his desk and emerged with a large board, filled with more wands.

"These wands are just merely samples of woods used in wand making. Try."

One after another is plucked out of my hands. As the colors start to get darker, Ollivander is actually smiling. The wand wood I picked up was a pale brown, almost dark color.

"Oho." Ollivander let out a small laugh as he plucked it out of my hand.

Ollivander hurried into the back of the store with the wand wood and the wand from before.

Soft noises came from behind the shelves. I waited…and waited…and waited.

Thirty minutes had passed, when Ollivander emerged from the back.

He placed it in my palm.

I waved it.

Immediately, there was a change in the air.

There was a smell of fungus and decay. The smell made my eyes water. A chill dropped the temperature. Then it warmed. My body felt light and warm to the tips of my fingers.

Then it was gone.

"Oh, bravo! Yes, indeed, oh, very good. Well, well, well... how curious... how very curious... " Ollivander smiled.

He put my wand back into its box and wrapped it in brown paper, still muttering, "Curious... curious..

"Sorry, but what's curious?"

Mr. Ollivander fixed my with his pale stare.

"I remember every wand I've ever sold, Mr. Potter. Every single wand. It so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather is in your wand, gave another feather - just one other. It is very curious indeed that you should be destined for this wand when its brother why, its brother gave you that scar."

I swallowed.

"Yes, thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Curious indeed how these things happen. The wand chooses the wizard, remember... I think we must expect great things from you, Mr. Potter... After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things - terrible, yes, but great."

I shivered. I wasn't sure I liked Ollivander much.

Ollivander muttered under his breath. "Elder and phoenix feather, eleven inches." The whisper was meant for me alone. I paid seven gold Galleons for his wand, and Mr. Ollivander bowed them from his shop.

The late afternoon sun hung low in the sky as we made their way back down Diagon Alley, back through the wall, back through the Leaky Cauldron, now empty. Up another escalator, out into Paddington Station, I only realized where I was when Hagrid tapped me on the shoulder.

"Got time fer a bite to eat before yer train leaves," Hagrid said.

He bought me a hamburger and we sat down on plastic seats to eat them. Everything looked so strange, somehow.

"You all right, Harry? Yer very quiet."

I wasn't sure he could explain. I'd just had the best birthday of my life - and yet - I chewed on my hamburger, trying to find the words.

"Everyone thinks I'm special," I said at last. "All those people in the Leaky Cauldron, Professor Quirrell, Mr. Ollivander... but I don't know anything about magic at all. How can they expect great things? I'm famous and I can't even remember what I'm famous for. I don't know what happened when Vol-, sorry - I mean, the night my parents died."

Hagrid leaned across the table. Behind the wild beard and eyebrows he wore a very kind smile.

"Don' you worry, Harry. You'll learn fast enough. Everyone starts at the beginning at Hogwarts, you'll be just fine. Just be yerself. I know it's hard. Yeh've been singled out, an' that's always hard. But yeh'll have a great time at Hogwarts - I did - still do, 'smatter of fact."

Hagrid helped me on to the train that would take him back to the Dursleys, then handed me an envelope.

"Yer ticket fer Hogwarts, " he said. "First o' September - King's Cross - it's all on yer ticket. Any problems with the Dursleys, send me a letter with yer owl, she'll know where to find me... See yeh soon, Harry."

The train pulled out of the station. I wanted to watch Hagrid until he was out of sight; I rose in my seat and pressed my nose against the window, but I blinked and Hagrid had gone.

 **AN: This story will mostly be told from Harry's POV.**

 **I also changed Harry's wand a bit, due to finding an article about wand woods on Pottermore.**


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